In the Dark
by MiyuTanemura
Summary: Natsu's punished. Drabble. Alternate universe, violence.
**Note:** Alternate Universe, violence, injury.

 **In the Dark**

As Natsu opened his eyes he didn't see anything.

It was dark.

An all-encompassing darkness that had him blinking his eyes, to no avail.

There were no changes.

Only, _darkness_.

Natsu closed his eyes and let his breath out in short gasps.

He hurt.

His arm hurt, his back hurt and his leg… he didn't want to think about it.

He was lying on the stone floor, but it wasn't his cot, it seemed to be one of the punishment rooms. And Natsu made to shake his head only to stop at the pain. He'd done it now.

Pushed too hard and had landed in this place.

Slowly Natsu sat up, biting his lip at the pain that came from his back, the ripped skin that was still stretched across the muscles.

"Things were never this bad when I was still at home." He told himself, having the words reverberate and echo back at him. "Then again, they were still pretty bad…" he continued his thought.

With his left hand, Natsu made slow touches to both his right arm and leg, feeling the skin caked with both dirt and blood. The arm seemed to only have a few dislocated bones – they were a pain but Natsu could handle it, or so he hoped – but his leg was another matter. They'd made cuts and dropped different things in them – it had hurt like hell but apparently things had numbed a bit. Still, he was still bleeding sluggishly from some of the cuts and his regeneration was kicking in all that much slower. It wasn't a good thing but Natsu could only think about how long they'd decide to leave him in this place.

It wasn't all that large but it seemed to be on the small side of things, his cot might be slightly larger – and that was saying something.

His stomach growled.

Natsu placed his hand on it and tried to will the hunger away.

It had been two days since he'd had food. Those assholes were having way too much fun with it and Natsu just couldn't wait for the day when he might go and punch all of those assholes' faces, let blood spill on their pristine white lab coats.

For now he could only daydream about that.

Oh but he also worried about the new batch of kids. There was that girl who was in the cot that followed his – her name was Wendy, he thought – and she wasn't feeling all that well in the new place, right from the beginning.

Natsu had to hang on. But, his breath was rattling in his chest. He was feeling like crap – a beating followed by being taken to the lab was never a good experience – but he was going to pull through this. He could handle everything these assholes threw at him, would set fire to it all and send it back to them with a nice punch.

"Just wait and see." He told the stone walls. His hand had run over the surface of one and it was humid and seemed to have slime coating it at odd times. It was unpleasant.

And time passed.

Natsu stretched his limbs, albeit painfully, cursing the forsaken place he'd been thrown into.

After a long while, he felt that he could feel and move his leg better. Finally, his body had gotten to straighten itself up, though it was painful and took too long. He didn't have food, fire or light. The walls seemed to close in, the sound of both his breathing and heartbeat was resonating too loudly. And Natsu was starting to doubt himself.

Then, a sound resounded like a shot in the darkness. Suddenly a bright light flooded the room, making him close his eyes with a pained noise. It was too much too soon.

Of course that they didn't give him respite.

One hand curled tightly over his arm, his dislocated bones seemingly jolting against each other and that made pain radiate up his arm.

Natsu let out a pained noise but his breath left him as he was kicked in the stomach. He tried to curl up onto himself but his other arm was grabbed and he was jerked upwards forcefully.

"Stand up, you filth." He could hear distantly. And, he did want to stand up without having to be held but he couldn't. His legs wouldn't support his weight. In the end, Natsu was dragged to the place.

'The labs again. Shit.' Were his last thoughts before he returned to the world of pain.

* * *

 **A/N:** Little drabble I felt like writing. This belongs to this long story I'm plotting. Hopefully it will see the light of day someday. If I have the courage to write it, lol.


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